DISCLAIMER: Sadly, I own nothing of any version of Phantom of the Opera. Gaston Leroux, Andrew Lloyd Weber, et al do.

-0-0-0-0-

"Gaston, forgive him. Promise."

My mother's last words to me were about my father. Not the man I called 'Father'. Not the one who raised me and loved me in his fashion. Not the one who gave me my name and my fortune; the one who gave me my face.

She wasn't even forty one when she died. She never really looked ill; consumption only rendered her beauty more haunting and delicate. Everyone expected her to just rise from her bed and return to life.

I have two flawlessly beautiful younger siblings. No one was permitted to treat me any differently than Philippe and Madelaine when we were growing up. Our education, our entertainments, our friends–all identical, except for the official Chagny functions. At such times, it was just Philippe and Madelaine; Gaston went for a special outing, or a quiet night in his room. No one ever said it was because of the way I look; my Mother would not have tolerated it. Yet, for some reason I couldn't understand, she permitted Father to have me locked away and present Philippe as the little vicomte. I never blamed her, for she so obviously adored me; I never saw shame in her eyes when she looked at me. I always felt it was me and Mother against the rest of the family, and that any humiliation I suffered was the result of a battle Mother had been unable to win on my behalf.

After Mother was buried, I left my father and siblings alone. They were grieving, but so was I. My advocate and protector was gone; the only woman who could ever love me.

I have a little treed patch at the back of the property, a fine house, servants, everything the firstborn Chagny would expect, except the glowing complexion, captivating eyes; you see my point. To tell the truth, they didn't put me out; I escaped from the main house when I was sixteen. At any rate, I was surprised to see Father at my door a few months after Mother was gone. I helped him in with the trunk he was hauling and poured us some wine. We can be civil. To be fair again, I was the one who created the distance between myself and my family. I got tired of them pretending that I was just as blond and beautiful as everyone else, tired of them feeling guilty for being repulsed.

"How are you, Father?"

"Oh, alright," he shrugged. "Lonely," he admitted, after a moment.

I looked out the window to give him a minute. I envy him his devotion to her. I'll never have that.

"How are you, Gaston?"

I nodded brusquely.

Father placed his hand on the trunk, patted it the way I'd seen him pat Mother's hand. "Gaston, this…is yours. Mother put some things aside from her time at the Opera…" his voice quavered.

Mother's time at the Opera; yes, we knew she had been there when she and Father rediscovered each other, but it wasn't discussed. The assumption among us children was that it was the unsuitability of a singer becoming a comtesse that made it a subject to be avoided.

"Thank you."

"I…don't know precisely what is in here, but I know generally what it's about. I'll try to help you in any way I can, after you've…looked at it." He rose to leave. "I hope you know that you will always have a home here."

"I do." What a peculiar thing to say. I shrugged; maybe it was his way of apologizing for being disappointed in me.

I finished the bottle of wine and stared at the trunk until I was just drunk enough to feel mean. Then I was ready to open it.

I knew there had been a fire at the Opera, and the overwhelming smell when I opened the trunk was of smoke.

Two small brass figures: a scorpion and a cricket.
A monkey music box; it still played.
Charred pages of musical scores done in red ink stirred my interest immediately, having inherited my love of music from Mother. Reading what I could of the scores, they were remarkable; soaring, passionate, strange music.
A man's black evening cloak; a single glove.
Dried roses, single buds tied with a black ribbon; dozens of them.
A heavy brass seal in the shape of a death's head.
Sketches of dresses–costumes?
Watercolors of sets and stagings. The only figure detailed enough to recognize in any of them was that of my mother as a young woman.
A prayer book.
A thin gold ring wrapped in a handkerchief monogrammed 'E'.
An inlaid wooden box, perhaps of Oriental design, containing fragments of white porcelain wrapped in a scrap of velvet.
Several charred wood figures, like children's dolls, brightly painted in elaborate costumes. The heads could be interchanged among them.
Opera programmes.
A sooty dress that may have been white at one time.
Shakespeare's Sonnets, inscribed 'For my muse. E.' in the same red-ink scrawl.
Several small cards, also in red ink:
'Treachery, Christine! Explain yourself, if you can. E.'
'Christine, I can be good, just love me. E.'
'Forgive me. Please come. E.'
Nothing else but newspaper clippings about the fire at the Opera, my Uncle's death, my parent's wedding, my birth announcement. I sat back and read them as I got drunker. Ultimately, the entire incident at the Opera House was blamed upon the mysterious Phantom of the Opera, who was never found, of course. It made a marvelous ghost story; nothing more.

I closed the trunk, disappointed. Apparently Mother had spent her married life dreaming of past glories from her brief career and a melodramatic romance she'd managed to wedge in between Raoul the boy and Raoul the man. I had no idea what it all had to do with me; even less why Father would have thought it was so important. I supposed she'd just wanted her treasured firstborn to have her precious junk…and he was fulfilling a last request. I felt a pang of sympathy for Father. How much did he know about 'E.'? How would he feel to know that twenty two years later this man was still so much in her thoughts, after the beautiful life he'd tried to give her?

It was unnerving and strange thinking of Mother as an inconstant wife, if only in her secret collection of mementoes. Even the inclusion of Philippe and Madelaine's birth announcements would have softened the edges of my discomfort.

I wasn't ready to sleep yet, so I rode into the city for the finest female companionship the Chagny fortune could buy. What is it they say: when you're rich, your jokes are funny, you're handsome, and you can sing. Actually, I do have a beautiful singing voice–but the money helps with the rest.

-0-0-0-0-

When I returned home early the following afternoon, Father was puttering unconvincingly with two spaniels close to my retreat. Never overly subtle, he approached too directly to have been doing anything other than watching and waiting for me.

I left the door open behind me without waiting and pushed ahead to drop my debauched carcass onto the bed. The stupid spaniels joined me, muddy paws and all, stubs wriggling. Father's concern drained into his habitual disappointment as he watched me from the doorway. I likely looked no worse than usual, but I fairly reeked of the two activities which had occupied my time since he'd seen me last. I'm sure I delighted the dogs.

"You're…alright, then?" he confirmed.

"Fine, fine. Screaming for sleep," I waved him away.

"You looked in Mother's trunk?"

"Yes. Junk, junk, junk!" I sang, dismissively.

My father's shock and anger flared impressively, but, ever Raoul, he calmed himself so quickly that it might have been my drunken imagination. "Gaston…" he sighed with familiar resignation. "It isn't junk." He shook his head and moved off, and I was gone before he shut the door behind him.

-0-0-0-0-

"Get up, you ugly bastard! The night is half over!" Rene pressed a bottle into my hand as he dragged me upright.

Victor peered out the window toward the main house. "Is your sister at home?"

"Only to human males," I assured him as I stirred to life. "Move, I need a piss." Ahhh, one of life's simplest pleasures.

"She'd be the luckiest woman alive!" Victor protested. "I'd treat her impeccably!"

"We've all seen how you do that," Rene snickered.

"Get your goddamn foot off, Rene, or I'll run you through!" I spat. He was sprawled in a chair using Mother's trunk for a footrest.

"Steady…what's in it anyway?"

"Mother's stuff."

"Oh. Sorry."

Ignoring him, I pressed through to the cupboard. We needed something on our stomachs to hold us awhile; food would not be the priority when we got to Paris. "What is the plan tonight anyway?" I asked, tossing bread and cheese around.

"Thought we'd go back to Madame Zizou's," Rene winked.

"Mignonette is in loooooove," Victor crooned. "You changed her life, at least that's what I heard."

"Hah. She was screaming for mercy. Once they meet the dragon, they're ruined forever." I sneered. "Pass the pepper." On a whim, I said, "Let's broaden our minds first, let's go to the theater."

"Theater girls are niiiiice," Victor remarked, unthinking, his normal state. I popped him lightly with the bottle but it caught his brow just right and made it bleed.

"Victor, you dolt," Rene patched him up and we were off.

It was surreal to sit in the audience at the Opera Populaire and picture Mother on that stage. I understood that it was rebuilt as closely as possible to the way it had been before the fire, so I knew I was seeing what my parents had seen when they re-met and fell in love. I just couldn't picture either of them in this world.

The girls in the ballet were all enticing; some of them looked barely older than Madelaine. My friends were all in favor of trying our luck backstage, but I wasn't in the mood for the staring, possible fainting, and general discomfort that goes with me trying to make a connection in an unfamiliar place. Victor was crushed that he might actually have to avail himself of a girl of legal age, but we returned to Zizou's.

"Oooooh, Gaston!" Mignonette was particularly effusive, but I'm a good tipper.

"Hello, Sweetheart, I just couldn't get enough of you." I said I was ugly. I didn't say I couldn't be charming. She's an appealing little whore, and it makes a pleasant fiction.

-0-0-0-0-

"Gaston, tea…"

I had no recollection of coming home, but it was my own bed, and my own sweet little sister plying me with something non-alcoholic. I scooted up to half-sitting and accepted the tea. Madelaine was blushing fiercely; she had no frame of reference for sleeping naked.

"Toss me that shirt, will you, Lili?" She complied gratefully. I have no idea why we've always called her Lili. I sipped tea and enjoyed her fresh, sunny presence. Beauty and the Beast.

"I miss you, Gaston. Why don't you ever come to the big house?"

"No reason," I shrugged. "This is my home. You know you can come anytime," I reminded her gently.

"Father said it's inevitable you will go your own way now. You aren't going to leave, are you?"

"No, Lili, where would I go?"

"I don't know. Sometimes it seems you don't like us," she worried.

"I will always love you, Lili," I emphasized.

We sat for some quiet minutes. Suddenly I remembered the trunk. "Oh, hey," I pointed, "Father gave me that, from Mother. It's a bunch of her theater mementoes, do you want to see?"

"If you don't mind, she gave it to you."

I shrugged, "It's just old Opera junk. Look." I slipped my trousers on and opened the trunk. I handed Lili the monkey music box and wound it up. As the tune repeated, I was surprised that she sang along.

"Masquerade,
Paper faces on parade…"

She saw the question on my face. "Lili, you know the song?"

"Mm. Mother used to sing it to us."

"Not to me. Sing it."

She waited for the starting point to come around.

"Masquerade,
Paper faces on parade
Hide your face
So the world will never find you–" eyes wide, she covered her mouth with her hand like a child caught swearing.

"Gaston, I'm sorry!"

"Well, we know why she didn't sing it to me, eh?" I cracked. "Here, what else, a bunch of music; dried roses, these should be illegal; why do women keep these?"

"Pretty box," Lili noticed. I handed it to her.

As she sat and opened the box, I slipped the notes from E. into my pocket. I was still ambivalent about learning of Mother's romance; I didn't want to reveal it to Lili. Fifteen, very sheltered; it was best if she held to the unsullied story of Christine and Raoul, childhood sweethearts, for the time being.

"A piece missing," Lili said softly.

"Hm?" I looked at the black velvet she'd spread across her lap. She'd assembled the broken pieces of white porcelain into a mask. She pointed to a small triangular space next to the eye.

"Just the one piece missing, here."

That mask bothered me and I didn't know why. I felt as if it was staring up at me, that vacant white face, demanding something of me, nagging at me. I gathered the pieces up in the velvet and shoved them back in the box.

"I'm sorry, Gaston."

"Don't be so sensitive, Lili! Stop apologizing!"

"I wish you'd stop being so angry," she sighed.

"I miss Mother, do you see?" I said, exasperated. Things were bubbling inside me that I'd kept submerged for months.

"I do, too, Gaston, we all do," she said gently.

"It's different, Lili. You'll always have someone. Who do I have now?"

"Me. I'm still here," she promised, slipping slender arms around me.

I shrugged her off and avoided her wounded face. "Until you marry a perfect man and have perfect babies and live a perfect life!"

"Alright, Gaston, I'm going. I can't bear it when you get like this," Lili surrendered.

-0-0-0-0-

My idiot friends wanted to return to the Opera to learn if ballerinas are truly as supple as they look. This suited me. I was in a black mood and happy to do without any company. My body appreciated the real food I took and a chance to sleep more than two hours at a time in a comfortable bed. I felt much better in the morning and decided another day of hibernation would be good. I put my feet up with Mother's book of the Sonnets.

Whoever E. was, he was certainly literate and searingly romantic to make such a gift to a woman. I couldn't picture my father wading through the Sonnets. Not that he's stupid; he appreciates good music and fine art. He's just not very imaginative; he's steady and dependable, not an artist. This E.–the book, the notes, and if the red ink could be believed, the music–was the antithesis of my father. I reviewed the music again, wanting to make the connection between E.'s signed notes and the scores. The handwriting could have been the same, but it was smaller and more scribbled on the scores. It was easier to see that the scribbles in pencil on the sketches and watercolors belonged to the same hand. The only connection to E. that I could make definitively was the red ink, and anyone in the world can write in red.

I laughed when I looked up and discovered I was losing the light. I'd spent the whole day in Mother's treasure chest. I wound up her music box and fell asleep before it finished playing.

I awoke in a marvelous mood, in spite of the stupid spaniels barking and tearing me from a delectable dream of Mignonette. After breakfast, I went back into the trunk to review all the newspaper clippings. I reread a clipping announcing my parents' small, private wedding, a few months after they ran from the burning theater together. As I glanced at my birth announcement, I was struck by the dates for the first time. I was one of those six-month first pregnancies, ha-ha. My first thought was how impressed I was with Raoul, actually. And Mother was growing more full of surprises with each passing day.

Next I turned to the news accounts of the Opera House: the fire, the reconstruction and reopening, a collection of articles full of wild speculation about the Opera Ghost–what a marvelous way to sell tickets. Several details about the night of the fire pulled at me. It was noted that all eyewitness accounts of the Phantom agreed that he was 'horrifying'. It seems that he took Piangi's place at the climax of the performance, and sang a 'scandalous' duet with my mother. Scandalous? The newspaper account continued that after the Phantom: "…was unmasked, the audience screamed in horror. The fiend then released the chandelier with an inhuman cry. As it crashed onto the stage below, the monster made his escape by falling through a trapdoor and into the dungeons of the burning Opera House with the terrified Miss Daae in his clutches." It read like a penny dreadful.

The terrified Miss Daae in his clutches? I thought she and Father escaped together. You can't believe these accounts, Gaston. They adored the idea of the ingénue falling through the floor with 'the fiend' as the theater burns.

Enough of that; I was rejuvenated and ready for Paris again. I decided to have a bath and go in search of my idiot friends. On my way to the stable, I noticed a promising new serving girl in the kitchen garden. I ducked out to collect a handful of peonies and then made my way around the garden to approach her directly. One does not sneak up on a lady–of any kind--with a face like mine. I have it all worked out: approach fully visible, no eye contact or smile; it looks like a grimace. Once you're certain you've been seen, (if she does not scream, faint, or run) turn to offer her an oblique view, focus your eyes at about the level of her chin, put a smile in your voice and be gallant–flowers are ideal for that.

No screaming, no fainting, no running; good.

"Good afternoon," I proffered the flowers.

"Thank you, Monsieur Gaston," blush, slight curtsey, nervous.

"Forgive me, Mademoiselle, we cannot have met…I would have remembered."

"No, but I know you live back here, and…"

"Ah. But still you hold me at a disadvantage…"

Another little curtsey. "I am Lucie, Mon–"

"Please…Gaston. We are likely nearly the same age. 'Monsieur' is my father."

She smiled, blushed shyly. "I can't…"

"But there's no one here. You don't think I'll tell, hm?"

Lucie sniffed the peonies and fluttered her eyes a little. She had magnificent breasts from where I was. I decided it would be alright to kiss her hand as I took my leave.

"Come visit some time, Lucie. Don't be shy."

-0-0-0-0-

I caught up with Rene at Zizou's. Victor would not be joining us. He was in love, it seemed, with a little dancer at the Opera; the first woman he'd not had to pay to perform a delightful, unspeakable act upon him. We muddled through without Victor sufficiently that I didn't stagger home for three days. When I slept, I was bothered by disjointed dreams of my mother as a girl at the Opera, and fire. Nothing normally disturbs my sleep, so I knew that the contents of Mother's trunk were working on me; though I wasn't conscious of it.

I was wicked parched when I awoke, so I sent for lemonade in quantity and dug back in to the trunk. I read the clippings again and found myself getting curiously irritated. I decided to go to the big house for supper and find out what Father knew.